banish the 1/1 rating

since the 1/1 rating of a photo serves no constructive or informative

purpose and causes nothing but grief for the recipient and much

investigative work for the abuse department then why not eliminate

it?

 

perhaps eliminate also the 1/2 and 2/1 combination for the same

reason. set the practical floor at 2/2, 3/1, and 1/3, which would

require the low rater to 'think' a moment or make added effort to do

so after having the system reject a 1/1

 

and, it would really be a nice holiday time bonus too to purge all

prior 1/1 scores from the entire system! how about it

What would be the point? There would be a new group of "lowest possible ratings", and the recipient would feel just as bad.

 

You could offset the ratings to go from 11 to 17 and it wouldn't change a damn thing.

 

A 7-point scale is interesting, because it has an 'average' point, slong with 'below/above average', 'bad/good', and 'cannot get any worse/better'.

 

I'll argue that I seem to see more 7s than 1s, and that giving so many pictures the "can't get any better" rating sounds like abuse as well.

It just turns the 2 into 1.

 

Ever seen 'This Is Spinal Tap'?

you misunderstand. the '1' rating (either for aesthetics, OR originality) would stay. but the 1/1 combo rating would go (just NOT both)

I'll say it again: It just turns the 2 into the 1.

how can '2 turn into 1' if 1 stays? try again

because 1 is the loneliest number.

ah spaghetti, how i admire your efforts, as futile as they may be in the end. i find myself daydreaming about a spaghetti western, "The Raters", where the good townspeople photogs are terrorized by the bullies who have come to rate with their harrassing 1's cuz they're just plain mean and like to spit on people's efforts. The sheriff cares little, cuz if the system ain't broke for him he ain't gonna fix nothin.' The town's schoolteacher, a commenter who disdains ratings altogether for their lack of meaningful feedback, find the courage to intervene after a particularly ugly incident where the raters torched the newspaper's journalist's photos of a protest march in the center of town, teaches those redeemable to actually actually write constructive feedback, and chases off the die-hards with the power of the uh, keyboard.

 

a boy can dream, spaghetti, i hope you never lose your ideals. they are worth maintaining and fighting for . . .

I don't like 7/2 or 6/1 either. Let's ban them too.

What you're saying is that eastetics and originality are interrelated, in a way that a picture that has the worst possible aestetics can't also have the worst possible originality.

 

I can very much imagine picture that deserve a 1/1. Think of the spontaneous "portrait" of a family member, shot from too close, red-eye and flash over-exposure, one person's face centered in the frame (or just below the center), lots of empty space at the top of the frame, not quite horizontal, clutter in the background with people cut by the frame edges.

 

In my opinion originality doesn't get much worse than that, same thing for aesthetics. Except of course if you're perverted and try to reproduce that look on purpose, in which case you could become very good at taking bad pictures on purpose. In that case I recommend that you buy a Holga ;-)

the proposal is simple and plain as day for brian to read it, thus its site feedback purpose fulfilled, so i need say no more

<cite>

since the 1/1 rating of a photo serves no constructive or informative purpose</cite>

<p>

Just how does that make the 1/1 rating different from the 5/6, or

3/2, or 7/7?

<i>It just turns the 2 into 1.<br><br>

 

Ever seen 'This Is Spinal Tap'?</i><br><br>

 

excellent... that was the first thing I thought when I looked at the title of the thread...

<a href="http://members.aol.com/chiprowe/gotoeleven.wav">here</a>

Sure a 1/1 rating serves an informational purpose, but it does require

some interpretation. The rater

<ol>

<li>thinks the photo is bad compared to

<ul>

<li>The other photos on photo.net

<li>The photos in National Geographic

<li>Ansel Adams

<li>Playboy (etc)

<li>His own pictures

</ul>

<li>is mad at

<ul>

<li>you

<li>his girlfriend

<li>everyone on photo.net

<li>Fox News Channel

</ul>

<li>thinks the photo is great, but is confused about which end

of the scale means good

<li>is just confused

</ol>

SW - I think you're not hearing the responses to your suggestion. The behavior that makes you believe the 1/1 is useless is probably the abusive behavior, and those people will just pick whatever is the "new" lowest-possible rating. Ultimately, it won't do anything to reduce that behavior.

 

As it stands, if you really believe that there are no images deserving of the double-stick rating, just give whatever rating you think is appropriate.

Thanks for the link Takaaki, I'm laughing. First thing I thought of also. Mary

this would make 2 the new 1. silly.

I can always count on Atkins to raise the level of discourse:-)

<p>

I don't rate anymore, but boy, I used to overload "aesthetics" with meaning since I felt

originality was fairly cut and dried (and relative unfortunately to what I've seen).

This is truly an idiotic suggestion.

Why not eliminate every rating but one and call it A. Then give every image posted A for effort then all the snivellers will complain that though everyone is equal, some ought to be more equal than others. So then we'll institute another, A+, then A++; and so, ad infinitum. :~p

In the same vein, I could change the scale to eliminate the numbers and just have words to describe the scale. It could run from "Excellent", "Magnificent", "Masterpiece", "Photo of the Century", on up to "Like the Face of God". People would complain about the drive-by low raters who down-rated their photos by giving them "Photo of the Century", bringing dowh their average.

easier to ridicule than address the issue constructively, isn't it? you could also work on encouraging more constructive feedback. be a leader.

Yes it is very easy to ridicule. People are ridiculous on this topic.

i do really appreciate it, and share your frustration at the focus on the "unfairness" of ratings. as you probably know from my postings, my point is that as a site manager you have the unique opportunity to structure and encourage and guide things in what you consider to be the right direction, and i encourage you to do that much more than engage in battle with what you think is the wrong, or wrong-headed, direction (yes, even when i may be in the second camp). i honestly think this site is a part of a revolutionary event in the history of photography enabled by the internet; i'd very much like to see it succeed. stay focused, stay cool, lead by example, there are potentially great things ahead.